Michael Rubin: NYC woman sues company run by 76ers co-owner after brain injury from falling chair, says report
NEW YORK CITY, NEW YORK: A company owned by Philadelphia 76ers co-owner Michael Rubin has been reportedly sued by a woman who claimed that a chair that flew off a penthouse terrace in Manhattan left her with brain injuries. Annabel Sen, a Brown University graduate, has reportedly brought the lawsuit after she met with the accident in January in Manhattan's Union Square neighborhood while she was going out for lunch with her boyfriend.
According to Sen’s Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit, which was reportedly filed on Thursday, September 24, the incident happened around 2.30 pm on January 25. As the 24-year-old was out, she “was struck by a heavy wooden lounge chair that fell from the terrace of the 12th-floor penthouse” of the 15 Union Square West Condominium building. Her lawyer, Benedict Morelli, told The New York Post, “How [the chair] didn’t kill her is a miracle honestly. She is very damaged but she is not dead.”
The paper filed in the court also stated that Sen, an employee of a private equity firm, “suffered a severe, life-threatening, traumatic brain injury, among other injuries, that required emergency brain surgery. [Sen] has since had two more brain surgeries”. She was due to get her master’s degree at Harvard this fall. The young woman has reportedly stated in the lawsuit that the chair should have been placed carefully on the porch, mainly because it “was a rainy day with very windy conditions”.
The lawsuit has been filed against the penthouse owner, GR Realty Holdings LLC, whose owner is Rubin. Rubin is also the co-owner of the 76ers basketball franchise and the New Jersey Devils hockey franchise, and has a net worth of about $3.5 billion. The documents mentioned that “Sen has been unable to attend to her usual vocation and activities,” in addition, she also has to pay for her medical bills. “[Sen] has suffered and will necessarily suffer in the future additional loss of time and earnings from employment,” it added.
The suit has also accused the building owner and management companies and penthouse residents Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi, for negligence. “There was really no reason for this to happen. You either bring the furniture in — especially if you’re not going to be there for a long time — or you tie it down. There are a number of people who could and should have done that,” Morelli said.
The lawyer also explained how the January accident forced Sen to shift with her parents in Connecticut. She has had to leave her job as well as her master’s program at Harvard. Morelli stated, “She is not doing anything now. She is just seeing doctors and recuperating. She has cognitive deficits. This was a young woman who was very gifted before the accident and we are hoping she gets back all of her faculties.”
The lawyer said: “Hopefully she will be able to regain enough to have a productive life going forward. We just don’t know yet,” as he added that in the next few months Sen’s tests will be conducted to check what she has lost physically, psychologically, emotionally and cognitively.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Rubin told The Post: “Michael Rubin has not lived in that apartment and did not live in the apartment as the apartment was rented to Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi at the time of the accident.” While no comment has yet been received from Dubugras and Franceschi — founders of startup company Brex — whose value was $2.6 billion in 2019 as per Forbes.